The U.S. retail sales grew more than expected in March, making it the first gain in four months and suggested that consumer spending has started regaining steam on the back of tax cuts and refunds. Retail sales surged by 0.6 percent in March, following a 0.1 percent decline in February, the Commerce Department showed on…
Oil prices have had a good week, as increased concerns in the Middle East caused investors to brace for a supply disruption. Although Energy Information Administration (EIA) data showed a higher-than-expected weekly increase in crude inventories, the markets shrugged off inventory build fears owing to geopolitical worries. What’s Impacting Prices? Official data from the Energy…
It’s time again for our weekly gasoline update based on data from the Energy Information Administration (EIA). The price of Regular and Premium were up a nickel each from last week. According to GasBuddy.com, California has the highest average price for Regular at $3.55 and San Francisco, CA is the most expensive city, averaging $3.68. Oklahoma…
Recently I have credited Fed chief Jay Powell for having moved closer to a more rule-based monetary policy and I have expressed the hope that we could be entering a new regime – a Powell Standard. This is probably somewhat overly optimistic, but it mostly reflects the fact that inflation expectations (and our forecasts for US inflation)…
The tech startup boom has been one of the most important and visible economic “growth engines” of the past half-decade. The boom was spurred, in large part, by the success and excitement over Facebook, Uber, Airbnb, and similar companies, which led to a widespread search for the “Next Facebook” or billion dollar “unicorn” company. Unfortunately,…
The prompt month May natural gas contract rose a bit more than half a percent today as the summer contracts caught more of a bid. After gapping up weakly, prompt prices were unable to continue much higher, settling right at the $2.752 level they opened at. Through the day contracts at the front of the…
Recent fears, warranted or not about the potential for retaliatory liquidation by China of its US Treasury holdings appear to have been exaggerated because according to the latest TIC data released, the trade-war enemy added $8.5 billion in TSYs in February (the most of any nation and the biggest monthly addition in six months)… But while…
Shares of Acacia Communications (ACIA) and Lumentum Holdings (LITE) both fell hard today. This is because one of their largest potential customers, China’s ZTE has been banned. What is going on? The U.S. Department of Commerce is banning American companies from selling components to Chinese telecom equipment maker ZTE Corp for seven years for violating the…
The U.S. stock markets have been witnessing volatility since February 2018. In fact, two major stock indexes — Dow 30 and S&P 500 — are lingering in negative territory so far this year. Notably, a series of political issues have taken a toll on the stock markets overshadowing the solid growth outlook. The recent stock…
Economist David Rosenberg expects the US dollar to fall. His Recommendation is to buy commodities Tell me the USD does not have considerable more downside potential. Buy gold. Buy oil. Buy commodities. pic.twitter.com/msoT1ZCSyQ — David Rosenberg (@EconguyRosie) April 16, 2018 That image of the dollar index is relative to June 2001. This is the chart…
